Ah, the guilty pleasures of life. Come on, we all have them. Some are more me-time oriented like a long bath, reading the newspaper or perhaps taking a stroll through the park. Others have a monetary cost such as escaping to a movie that doesn't involve cartoon characters, getting a new CD or indulging in a pint of Ben & Jerry's. Ok, maybe not the whole pint, always seems to be scavengers around.

For me, I enjoy a cup of Starbucks coffee. I don't frequent the place everyday, typically stop by there on the weekends assuming the drive-thru isn't mobbed. This guilty pleasure has become even more so with the rising gas prices. Gasoline doesn't taste as good as coffee and my car won't run on coffee (yet), so for now I continue to buy both. However, getting to my local Starbucks might involve more gas due to a recent announcement. Starbucks will be closing 600 U.S. stores during the next year. According to the press release, the majority of stores are near another Starbucks and aren't profitable.

Well, if Starbucks believes that I will drive another 100 yards to get to the next closest store they can forget it. Seriously, it's a bit more than 100 yards, however Starbucks seem to have become as ubiquitous as McDonalds in many areas of the country. On a recent trip to Chicago, two stores were almost directly across the street from one another. Guess we've become so lazy as a society that crossing a street is too much effort.

With the economy continue to struggle, those critical of Starbucks are coming out of the woodwork. "The coffee is too expensive", "The quality isn't there", "The stores displace local establishments" and so on. Hey folks, they must have done something right. Even after closing 600 stores they still will have over 15,500 stores internationally. If Starbucks is guilty of anything, perhaps it's trying to grow too fast. Most of the stores to be closed have been opened in the last 2 years.

Rest assured, Starbucks isn't going anywhere, so the naysayers will need to continue to wax on about the ills of large corporations. Hey, for many of us it isn't so much about buying into the Starbucks stereotypes, we just want to indulge in a guilty pleasure before facing challenges of the day.